X-Plane Simulation

WARNING

This simulator is community supported and maintained. It may or may not work with current versions of PX4 and may be removed in future releases. See Toolchain Installation for information about the environments and tools supported by the core development team.

X-Plane can be used with PX4 for Software-In-The-Loop (SITL) simulation through the community-supported px4xplane bridge plugin. PX4 runs as the flight controller, while X-Plane provides the vehicle dynamics, visual scene, and simulated sensor inputs. The px4xplane bridge is an X-Plane plugin: it runs inside X-Plane, accepts PX4's simulator MAVLink connection, publishes simulated sensors to PX4, and writes PX4 actuator outputs to X-Plane datarefs.

Supported Vehicles

PX4 includes X-Plane SITL airframes for the following vehicles:

Vehicle	Type	PX4 target
Cessna 172	Plane	make px4_sitl_default xplane_cessna172
TB2	Plane	make px4_sitl_default xplane_tb2
Ehang 184	Multicopter	make px4_sitl_default xplane_ehang184
Alia-250	VTOL quadplane	make px4_sitl_default xplane_alia250
QuadTailsitter	VTOL tailsitter	make px4_sitl_default xplane_qtailsitter

The matching X-Plane aircraft files and bridge configuration are distributed by the px4xplane project. Additional X-Plane aircraft or vehicle models can also be integrated when PX4 has a matching SITL-capable control path and px4xplane can map the required actuator outputs to writable X-Plane datarefs.

Installation

1. Install the PX4 development environment on the machine, container, or WSL2 environment that will run PX4 SITL.

2. Install X-Plane 11 or X-Plane 12.

3. Download the latest OS-specific px4xplane release package from the px4xplane releases page.

4. The release package is an archive, not an installer. Extract it and copy the complete px4xplane plugin folder into:

   X-Plane/Resources/plugins/px4xplane

5. Copy the matching X-Plane aircraft folders from the same extracted package into an X-Plane aircraft directory. Keep the packaged 64/config.ini with the px4xplane plugin unless the release notes say otherwise.

The px4xplane build and installation guide has more detail on the plugin folder layout.

Network Setup

PX4 connects to the X-Plane bridge on TCP port 4560. The default host is localhost, which is suitable when PX4 and X-Plane run on the same Linux or macOS machine.

For Windows, the usual setup is X-Plane running natively on Windows and PX4 running in WSL2. In that case, set PX4_SIM_HOSTNAME in the WSL2 shell to the Windows host IP before starting PX4. This variable is set on the PX4/SITL side and points to the host where X-Plane and the px4xplane plugin are running:

export PX4_SIM_HOSTNAME=$(ip route | awk '/default/ {print $3; exit}')

Then start the desired PX4 target from the same shell. If PX4 runs in Docker or on another computer, set PX4_SIM_HOSTNAME to the reachable IP address or hostname of the X-Plane machine instead. Make sure inbound TCP port 4560 is allowed by the firewall on the X-Plane host.

Running SITL

1. Start X-Plane and load the aircraft that matches the PX4 target.

2. Confirm the px4xplane plugin is loaded in the X-Plane plugin menu.

3. Start PX4 SITL. For example:

   cd PX4-Autopilot
   make px4_sitl_default xplane_alia250

4. Connect QGroundControl to PX4 as usual.

PX4 prints Simulator connected on TCP port 4560 when the bridge is connected.

Custom Aircraft

To add another X-Plane aircraft:

1. Create a PX4 airframe file in ROMFS/px4fmu_common/init.d-posix/airframes.
2. Add a matching SITL target in src/modules/simulation/simulator_mavlink/sitl_targets_xplane.cmake.
3. Configure the px4xplane bridge to map PX4 actuator outputs to the aircraft datarefs.
4. Tune the PX4 parameters from ULog data and X-Plane truth logs.

See the px4xplane custom airframe guide for bridge configuration details. For X-Plane-side aircraft design and dataref mapping, see the official Plane Maker manual and X-Plane datarefs reference.

Troubleshooting

If PX4 waits for the simulator, verify that X-Plane is running, the px4xplane plugin is loaded, PX4_SIM_HOSTNAME points to the X-Plane host, and TCP port 4560 is not blocked.

If the aircraft loads but does not respond correctly, verify that the X-Plane aircraft, PX4 target, and px4xplane configuration all refer to the same vehicle.

If estimator warnings appear, keep the simulator frame rate stable, check that the intended airframe parameters were loaded, and inspect the ULog sensor and estimator topics before changing bridge or airframe parameters.